Relying on wisdom

When Cervantes’s Don Quiote observed that “there were but two families in the world, Have Much and Have Little”, he was not simply describing the gulf between the rich and the poor. It was rather that some families have much that makes them an object of public interest. By extension, it might be said that some families have so much that they become the public interest. Whatever one may think of the reports of incipient tension within the Ambani family, there is just no denying that their affairs have become a matter of public interest in every sense of the term.

Over the years, the Ambanis have graduated from being a corporate house to the corporate house. The transition in India’s economy is jokingly described as the transition from self-reliance to Reliance. The future of the stock markets, the buoyancy of government revenues, the confidence of Indian industry, the fate of a large numbers of workers, the interest of numerous share-holders, the satisfaction of millions of consumers, and the corporation’s own sense of dynamism and can-do attitude are all intertwined with the future of Reliance. This puts extraordinary responsibility among the Ambani brothers to settle whatever issues may divide them amicably. Reliance has the advantage of having created professional companies poised to rule the 21st century. Hopefully, this professionalism will help Reliance avoid the fate of so many grand family-run businesses. But still a company is identified with the entrepreneurs at its helm. It would be a pity if so grand and innovative an edifice was to be rocked by the oldest and most predictable snafu: the family quarrel. It is perhaps because of this that the Ambani brothers appear to be making moves to address the issue. But it is important that the resulting agreement be clear, decisive and leave no room for speculators to make undue profits, or leave the future of the companies uncertain.

Reliance’s success was founded on imaginatively breaking through the regulatory structure of the Indian state. It would be hugely ironic if its fate hung on a tedious, messy and long drawn legal battle. The Ambani brothers ought to be smart enough to prevent lawyers and profit makers from making money at their expense. The professionalism of Reliance will ultimately be judged by its ability to overcome the egos and differences of its powerful siblings, and act in the public interest.